Sport and Recreation Minister Trevor Mallard met Thursday with Bruce Ullrich of the Christchurch group proposing a bid for the 2018 Commonwealth Games and said the meeting was “positive” adding that talks on a 2018 Games bid would be held with the New Zealand Olympic Committee. But he said any decision on government support was some time off.
The Christchurch group says any proposal would require significant financial backing from the government.
Mallard said “part of it has got to be a discussion about whether there should be a New Zealand bid for 2018. We haven’t decided what the New Zealand bid is and how to pay for it if that occurs. I think that we wouldn’t want to be at the point that we’d never have a Commonwealth Games in New Zealand”.
Mallard said there were several possibilities for a New Zealand Games bid. Christchurch and Auckland were likely contenders. He said, “there’s no hurry on it. It would be good to know whether we had a New Zealand bid by the end of the year”.
Ullrich, vice-chairman of the organizing committee for the 1974 Games in Christchurch said, “we have been working on this project for about 12 months. Of all the cities in the Commonwealth we think that Christchurch is one that could stage the Commonwealth Games most economically”.
He believes a “no-frills” Christchurch bid, which would not require major capital development, would cost significantly less than the $2.3 billion spent on the Melbourne Commonwealth Games last year. “There’s got to be significant government input to stage the Games. Government support at the two most recent Games has been in the range of 80 to 90 per cent”.
He said, “the crux of this is to what extent can we keep the operational costs to a minimum. The only capital cost we need to look at is maybe a new (cycling) velodrome and possibly a new rowing venue”.
He said Mallard’s suggestion of holding those events at existing facilities was something that could be considered.
The group will now rally government ministers and attempt to generate support in principle for the bid.
New Zealand Olympic Committee secretary-general Barry Maister said the committee was starting to work with the government to establish a process for assessing the feasibility of bidding for the Games. He said it was too early to “come out and speculate” on the merits of specific locations.
